I guess I'm an old-fashioned girl. Really, really old fashioned.

I've yet again gotten swept up into the 1920s, 30s, 40s. Is it possible to be nostaligic for an era many decades before I was born?

On Saturday night, I had a blast at the Wabasha Street Caves in St. Paul during a Lions Club benefit.

The flapper/mobster theme party featured big band music, and gambling at the craps table lured me in. When I got to hold a tommy gun on the tour of the caves (which were a prohibition-era night club) I was sold.

Then, Monday, as I flipped through TV channels, I couldn't pull myself away from watching "Wuthering Heights" with Laurence Olivier in its entirety.

I  blame my obsession on childhood dance lessons, which rolled over into an intrigue with musicals, which were a gateway to classic films.

I was a second-grader with a Fred Astaire/Ginger Rogers habit.

I rented "Top Hat" and "The Gay Divorcee", "Swing Time" and "Shall We Dance" from the movie store when my friends couldn't get enough of the Brat Pack.

I exhausted the store's resources (the owner even indulged me by adding more films to his collection...since he knew I'd check them out at least three-times each, it covered his costs).

I was a junkie in a time without the Turner Classic Movies channel.

I couldn't put down "Gone With the Wind" - it's a page turner. Seeing the movie, I was sure I wanted to marry Clark Gable when I grew up. (I still don't think that was entirely a bad idea....)

What is it about this time period? The music - Count Basie, Glenn Miller? The dance?

Maybe, it's that the movies, music and dance were about escaping for an hour or two. Today's movies seem to take the worst-case real-life scenarios and challenge actors to reenact or disect harsh realities.

Perhaps, then, it was a kinder, gentler time on the silver screen, even if it wasn't a kinder, gentler time in our country's history?

What period from the past is your match?